Montreal School District Standardizes Video Surveillance

  • By Dian Schaffhauser
  • 05/29/14

A major project to install video cameras in 80 Montreal schools is done. The Commission Scolaire Marguerite-Bourgeoys has completed a project to place three-dozen surveillance cameras into each secondary school and about six in each primary school for a total of nearly 900. The Commission chose Hikvision IP cameras and Milestone Systems IP video management software. The project was managed by Alpha TSi, a Canadian network security integrator.

According to reporting in La Presse, a French language newspaper in Montreal, some of the schools already had cameras; others didn't. All of the various installations used different kinds of video gear. With the new $1.6 million (Cdn.) implementation, all of the cameras within each school will be managed from a central location. At that time, the commission said that the cameras wouldn't be monitored full time. They were there to record activity should an incident occur and require future review.

"The video quality provided by Hikvision cameras has been truly superb," said IT Services Director Rémi Asselin. "Both Hikvision and Milestone products demonstrated outstanding functionality for educational facilities. We are very happy with the outcome."

The specific equipment chosen included fixed 1.3-megapixel domes for indoors and outdoors, set in common areas such as the cafeteria and locker walls, as well as school entries. The cameras work with Milestone's administration software, XProtect.

About the Author

Dian Schaffhauser is a former senior contributing editor for 1105 Media's education publications THE Journal, Campus Technology and Spaces4Learning.

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